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Cindy's World Trip Blog

October 21, Month 5

Samoa - When I Grow Up, I Want To Live In A Fale

"It's uncle Bob! It's uncle Bob!" My girls shouted one day as they looked out of the window. I looked at them confused. Their uncle Bob is obviously not here. They told me that they had named a beautiful red and black bird that lands on our window several times a day "uncle Bob." We have been thinking about the real uncle Bob ("Hi Bob") a lot because he lived in Samoa over 30 years ago when he served a mission here. We wish he were here with us.

When I was little I remember listening to Bob talk about Samoa and thinking it sounded pretty cool. Funny thing is I don't remember one detail except the Samoan name for a random thing. I just remember the feeling of "ooh, that sounds like a cool place."

In our couple of weeks here I haven't been disappointed. This is a cool place. The first few days I was completely enthralled simply by driving around and looking at everything. I have been especially interested in Samoan homes.

When we moved into our present house in Texas over a year ago, I told Richard that I was sick of moving so we better find a place where I could be buried in the backyard. Everyone I told this to would laugh. If I were to tell a Samoan, they would probably just ask, "Why the backyard?"

They might ask this because it is common to see a grave of a family member out in the front yard. Sometimes they build a little roof over the graves too. I don't get the impression that Samoan's move much. The ready installed graves wouldn't add curb appeal. I think it shows respect to the deceased though. They can't be forgotten.

Families seem to have a strong bond and many generations often live on the same land with a new structure added for each new little family. (And as the older ones die they move to the front yard.)

The Samoan homes vary a lot. Some live in the most traditional Samoan homes - a fale, an oval hut type structure made of wood with a roof of palm tree leaves, tin, or a combination of tin and leaves. One of our taxi cab drivers said that fales are great because with the exception of power and gas, they can pretty much live for free on their parents' land. More modern homes like we are used to seeing are present too. Some strike a balance between traditional Samoan homes and modern homes by combining the two - a big open patio (fale) out in the front connected to a modern house in the back. Still others like the guy by where we live, has combined traditional and modern in a different way - a traditional fale with a huge TV. And nice stereo system set up. It is funny to see out there in the open like that, but it works.

We spent a couple nights in a fale on the beach. I can see why they have passed the test of time because they are pretty great. Lots of airflow kept us surprisingly cool. They even kept us dry during a heavy downpour. We aren't staying in a fale now though.

We arranged to meet with a real estate agent when we arrived to find a place for the month. It wasn't a hard decision where to stay because there was exactly one furnished place that would rent by the month. It is a nice modern place with two bedrooms, a living room-kitchen combination, a bathroom and a washer. It even has air conditioning in 3 rooms (both bedrooms and the kitchen) - a welcome improvement over our place in Costa Rica. I hang my clothes out after they are washed on the covered patio. This works out great except for when it rains on a diagonal. We get our power from a company called "cash power," a pre-pay company. A meter in our kitchen that shows how many units we have at any given time. As we get low, we have to go get more credits on the box. I am surprised how expensive the electricity is. Maybe we should reconsider staying in a fale.

The A/C seems to make it nicer for the girls to concentrate on school work. We are plugging along with school. I think we are all starting to get used to the home schooling thing. The girl's teachers (us) are super impatient sometimes and they are super whiney sometimes, but overall improvement on both sides is being made. Our biggest problem is keeping the kids on task and keeping them from bothering each other. I just had to send Ellie to the other room because she kept trying to irritate her sister. It seems to be her favorite boredom buster. We have hopes that our girls will grow closer from our trip. At times it seems like the exact opposite is happening. Only time will tell.

I know very little about how school works here for Samoan kids. I don't know if school is mandatory because I see kids out and about when other kids are in school. The high-schools are called "colleges" and all schools require uniforms.

When I was in elementary and I would complain about wearing a dress to church, my mom used to tell how she had to wear a dress every day to school not just to church. I couldn't believe it. Here although the uniforms vary from school to school, all include skirts for the girls and lava-lavas for the boys. Sounds like a nightmare from my childhood, but the kids look sharp. Most businesses have uniforms too - skirts for the women and lava-lavas for the men. The shoes are the same for everyone - Flip-flops.

The people we have met have been friendly. They are curious where we are from and how we like Samoa. Even the street vendors never try to sell us anything without first asking where we are from, where we are staying, and how we like it here.

We like it quite well and we're happy we are here. "Uncle Bob" will continue to keep us company as we see and learn lots of interesting things.